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Intro
Odie O’Banion lives on the banks of the Gilead River. When his great-grandchildren visit, Odie tells them stories, including his memories of the summer of 1932, when he was 12 years old. Odie believes that hope is central to every good story.
Odie’s story begins at Lincoln Indian Training School in Fremont County, Minnesota. After his father’s death, Odie and his brother, Albert, are placed under the care of the Brickmans, who own and operate the school. They are the only two white children in residence. Mrs. Brickman is strict and hands out hard punishments. As he grows older and more rebellious, Odie spends many nights in the quiet room—an old solitary-confinement chamber. Mrs. Brickman—nicknamed “the Black Witch” by her students—threatens to send Odie to the reformatory.
The children at Lincoln School are hired out as free labor to local farmers like Mrs. Cora Frost, a widow with a young daughter, Emmy. She offers to let Odie, Albert, and their friend Mose—a Sioux boy whose tongue was cut out when he was small—live with her and work on her farm. Sadly, a tornado destroys the Frost farm and kills Mrs. Frost, leaving Emmy, now an orphan, to be adopted by the Brickmans. Odie retrieves Emmy’s family photo from the farm’s wreckage and is punished for it. DiMarco, the groundskeeper, brings Odie to the quarry, where he admits to killing another boy—Billy Red Sleeve—and threatens Odie. Odie kills DiMarco by pulling him over the quarry’s ledge. He, Albert, and Mose resolve to run away. With the help of Volz, a German man employed by the school, the boys kidnap Emmy and steal the contents of the Brickmans’ safe before taking the Frosts’ canoe down the Gilead River.
Odie, Albert, Mose, and Emmy paddle down the river, using the stolen money to buy food and shoes. Reading some letters from the Brickmans’ safe, Odie discovers the superintendents were stealing money meant for the children in their care. Emmy is prone to epileptic fits and sleepwalking, during which she makes ominous statements which she later forgets.
A farmer catches the children sleeping in his shed. The man—one-eyed Jack—locks the boys in his barn but lets Emmy sleep in the farmhouse. While living in captivity, Odie and the others work Jack’s neglected land. A heavy drinker, Jack is prone to violence but eventually warms to the children and thanks them for restoring the hope he lost when his wife (Aggie) and daughter (Sophie) abandoned him. One night, Jack becomes drunkenly enraged at Emmy, and Odie shoots him in the chest with Mr. Brickman’s gun.
On the run again, the group encounters a Sioux man named Forrest who tells them the Brickmans are offering a reward for their capture. Not trusting the man, Albert convinces the others to run during the night. One of the Brickmans’ letters is from Odie and Albert’s Aunt Julia, who lives in Saint Louis, Missouri. The group decides to make their way there. In the evenings, Odie plays his harmonica and tells stories to raise his friends’ spirits.
When they reach the Minnesota River, the children follow the sound of singing to religious group that has established a tent settlement there. The children encounter Sister Eve, a preacher and alleged healer. During one service, Odie and Emmy save Eve’s life from a volatile congregant, and she takes them under her wing. She has the peculiar ability to see into peoples’ pasts by touching their hand. Albert and Mose are also welcomed into Eve’s group, the Sword of Gideon Healing Crusade. Eventually, Odie discovers that Sister Eve pays off the people she heals. While confronting her, Albert is bitten by a rattlesnake belonging to Sid, the trumpet player. Eve tells Odie that the lies she tells give people hope that miracles are possible—that hope, Eve suggests, is what heals them. Albert barely survives the snakebite, and the newspaper prints an article about the story. Odie and his friends are forced to abandon the crusade and flee from the Brickmans, who are in hot pursuit.
Odie tells his friends a story about four Vagabonds on a journey. He thinks of Albert, Mose, and Emmy as his family. While camping on an island, they discover the skeleton of a Native American child, and Mose is overcome with melancholy and anger. After a fight with Albert, Odie storms off and wanders the city of Mankato, where he sees the police beat Bonus Army protesters. When Odie returns to camp, the others are gone.
Odie searches for his friends along the river. Following the sound of music, he discovers a shantytown of people left impoverished by the Great Depression. There, he meets the Schofield family, whose truck broke down on their way to Chicago. The Schofields’ daughter, Maybeth, captures Odie’s heart. Odie is struck by how the community (called Hopersville) cares for its members despite their lack. Later, police arrive and search Hopersville, brutalizing its citizens. Believing the authorities are after him, Odie is about to intervene when Forrest finds him and leads him back to his family. With Mose still in a dark mood, Forrest leads him on a journey to discover the history of his people.
While the others wait, Odie returns to Hopersville to check on Maybeth. He takes the money Sister Eve gifted them and gives it to Mr. Schofield. Despite his alcohol addiction, Mr. Schofield uses the money to get his family back on the road to Chicago. Mose tells the others what he has learned about the Sioux and their war against white settlers. While his despair has not lessened, Mose seems surer of his identity. Hearing that the Brickmans have caught up to them, the group moves on once more.
Odie and his friends find safety in Saint Paul, where Forrest’s friend Gertie Hellmann lives with her partner, Flo. The community of the West Side Flats cares for its members through mutual aid and nonjudgmental kindness. In the city, Odie encounters one-eyed Jack, who miraculously survived Odie’s shot and has reunited with his family. Albert endears himself to Truman Waters by fixing his towboat, and he and Mose accept jobs aboard the vessel. Emmy, likewise, is happy in Saint Paul. Feeling alone and suspecting he is the cause of all their hardship, Odie abandons the group and hops on a southbound train, hoping to reach Aunt Julia in Saint Louis.
Upon arriving in Saint Louis, Odie locates Aunt Julia’s house, but their reunion is oddly strained. Eventually, Odie learns that Aunt Julia runs a brothel, and she does not think her home is a good place for Odie to grow up. Disillusioned, Odie wanders the city and comes upon Sister Eve and the crusaders. Eve tells Odie she suspects that Emmy’s seizures allow her to see and alter the future, speculating that the little girl has saved their lives many times during their journey. When Odie returns to Aunt Julia’s house, she reveals to him that she is his biological mother and begs his forgiveness. Suddenly, the Brickmans arrive. Mrs. Brickman bears a grudge against Aunt Julia, who used to work for her. She demands Odie lead her to Emmy, whose strange powers she hopes to exploit. Mrs. Brickman shoots Odie in the leg before Aunt Julia pushes her out a window to her death.
While Odie waits for Aunt Julia—his mother—to regain consciousness, Albert, Mose, and Emmy arrive. Emmy suffered a fit on the way there, suggesting that she used her special powers to save Aunt Julia’s life. Sister Eve tells Odie that storytelling has its own kind of power, and he imagines his mother waking up. At the novel’s end, Odie imagines God as a river flowing endlessly through time. Though he embellishes his memories for his great-grandchildren, Odie insists there is a seed of truth in every story.
